


the evening redness

by coatsandjumpers



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: 1850s, Alternate Universe - Road Trip, Alternate Universe - Western, Arthur is 17, Getting Together, M/M, Sharpshooter!Arthur, but with horses instead of cars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-03
Updated: 2020-07-03
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:40:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,869
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25042546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coatsandjumpers/pseuds/coatsandjumpers
Summary: “Okay,” Arthur says, slow as molasses.“Okay,” Eames echoes, “but I need to know you can shoot.”
Relationships: Arthur/Eames (Inception)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 53





	the evening redness

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: At one point in the fic, Arthur uses the word "Indians" to refer to Native Americans. It's not meant to be pejorative, but it seemed too anachronistic to have Arthur use "Native Americans" instead. Please be aware that that's up ahead!

The sun is high when Eames steps into the bar. The light hits the ground hard and clean, but inside, the time of day is an unknown, the windows sparse and the grime dark.   
  
It’s close to empty— the way Eames likes it. His steps are soft on the floor, and the dirt is uneven but hard-packed beneath his boots. The bartender’s eyes flick up as he approaches, but he doesn’t stop wiping a glass, the barcloth trailing his wrist like a snake.   
  
“Que quieres?”   
  
“Cerveza.”   
  
The bartender pulls a beer from below the counter and sets it down with a clank. The noise is loud in the hall. Eames notices a man a few seats away, mostly shadowed in the dimness of the bar. He’s smoking, but he looks young, the curves of his face strangely soft when they touch the light.   
  
Eames turns back to the bartender.   
  
“Dos,” he says, holding up two fingers for good measure. The man nods, and a second beer joins the first.   
  
The man doesn’t look up when Eames sits next to him, and he makes no move towards the beer, an untouched offering. Up close, Eames is less sure of his age. The fingers around his cigarette, paper crinkled where it’s been rolled, are callused and dull, dark with dirt around the nails. Eames looks at the man’s face and wonders.

It’s silent for a while. Eames sips at his beer, just shy of warm, and waits. He’s not often one for patience, but he feels drawn to this man, and he’s composed within that conviction— moth, flame.   
  
The cigarette glows deep red, an animal eye in the gloom. The man takes one last drag, fingers perched delicately on the paper, then drops the roach to the ground and grinds it under his heel in one swift movement. It’s only then that he reaches for the beer.   
  
His voice is slow when he asks, “What do you want?”   
  
“Depends,” says Eames. “Can you shoot?”   
  
“Why?”   
  
“It’s part of the job.” It’s a moot point. Any man this far west of the Mississippi should know his way around a gun. 

When the man doesn’t respond, Eames adds, “There’s a saddle, a horse, and a gun in it too.”   
  
That piques his interest. He turns fully towards Eames now, face finally emerging into the light.   
  
“Okay,” he says, slow as molasses.   
  
“Okay,” Eames echoes, “but I need to know you can shoot.”   
  
The man raises an eyebrow, drops his glance to Eames’ waist. Eames understands, draws, and puts the gun square in the man’s upturned palm. A second offering.   
  
Silence, then— the gunshot cracks through the bar, followed instantly by the crystalline shatter of glass. Eames sees a small shot glass on the other side of the bar explode, as though of its own accord.   
  
The bartender is yelling, already moving towards them.   
  
“Tranquilo, tranquilo,” Eames says hastily, “Voy a pagar.”   
  
He takes his gun back, holsters it, and says, “We leave tomorrow at dawn.”   
  
“What’s the job?” asks the man.   
  
“Bone-picking.” It’s grim work, but it’s a living. Buffalo bones shipped east to be transformed into fertilizer and bone china: death made commercial.   
  
“Better than scalping,” the man says with the barest hint of dryness.   
  
Eames takes it as the acquiescence it is.   
  
“Dawn, then.” He drops a few coins on the bar - close to his last few, with the extra glass - and puts his hand out.   
  
“Eames.”   
  
The man takes his hand. “Arthur.”   
  
Eames nods and leaves, satisfied.   
  
The morning dawns chill and sharp, and the horses breathe white into the air. Arthur saddles up while Eames ties down supplies onto a third horse, and then they’re off.   
  
Arthur doesn’t say how old he is, and Eames doesn’t ask. It doesn’t matter. There are no children here, not really— the west makes sure of that.   
  
\---   
  
The small town fades quickly behind them as the brown walls simply melt into the earth, flat beiges and tans reclaiming the landscape. Cholla dots the landscape dark, and the peppered dirt runs clear to the horizon. They ride through, adamantine mountains shimmering in their peripherals, knobs on the spine of the world.   
  
The earth rises to meet the horses’ hooves at a constant clip that fades easily into a familiar white noise. In the early days, the white noise is all they have— Arthur is not a talkative man. Their voices run hoarse on the few words they do exchange, like the dirt has penetrated deeper than skin.   
  
The grit is relentless, and before long, they’re covered in a fine white-tan dust, ghosts in the desert heat. A river that cuts through the landscape like blue thread comes as a relief, even when they have to dismount to lead the horses through. The dust swirls white through the stream before it’s whisked away, and they emerge water-dark from the hips down, like they’ve been dipped in paint.   
  
The beat of the sun dries them off before long, but their boots remain sodden, leaving stains of wet on the horses’ hair. That night, in front of the fire, they slip off their damp and reeking shoes, scorpions be damned. It’s easy enough to unsaddle two of the horses and drop the saddles to the earth, resting their ankles on the curve of the leather so the fire’s warmth can reach them.   
  
It’s almost homey, the saddles as footstools, the beans as warm cooking, and the vast expanse of the land as their own hearth. It raises something strange in Eames’ chest, and instead of finishing eating in silence, he asks, “Do you have family out here?”   
  
He keeps his eyes steady on the flames.   
  
“No,” Arthur responds, simply. The quiet stretches long before Arthur continues, “My family is gone.”   
  
“I’m sorry,” Eames says.   
  
“Don’t be.” Arthur’s laugh is low and harsh. “After my ma died, I picked up and left. Wasn’t much worth staying for. That was years back now.”   
  
It’s a common enough story. Few people choose to come to no-man’s land— they just end up there. But something sticks in Eames’ throat until his curiosity outweighs his courtesy, and he asks, “Years back? How old are you, exactly?”   
  
It’s hard to tell in the firelight, but Eames thinks Arthur looks amused when he responds, “Seventeen.”   
  
At that, Eames falls silent. He searches Arthur for evidence of his age, but just when he thinks he might see youth in the curve of his cheek, the flames flicker, and Eames is left with nothing but lines darkened by dirt and a gaze too heavy for his years.   
  
\---   
  
They find what they’re looking for four days deep into the desert, the memory of creature comforts already lost to the wind. It’s an old carnage, and the scattered skeletons are tinged red with the soil. Some of the horses’ rib cages are half submerged in loose earth like prehistoric relics waiting to be rediscovered.   
  
It’s not bison, but rumor has it that all the bison are gone, hunted, and besides— bones are bones.   
  
Eames lingers by the horses, curious to see how Arthur will handle the dead. At seventeen, he’s not likely to have done this before. At seventeen, Eames thinks, he’s not likely to have done much at all.   
  
Eames knows the unfair truth of the world though: that for some men, seventeen might as well be fifty. If Arthur is a newcomer, he shows no hesitation, moving from corpse to corpse with all the calm of the reaper himself. He focuses on femurs, tibias, ribs, snapping the bones off of horses and humans alike. In his wake, Arthur leaves neat vertebrae stripped of ribs, and it’s all strangely tidy for such a grisly business.   
  
Together, they fill their bags with bones, stacking them together as best they can. As though by unspoken agreement, any human skulls remain untouched. When they finally leave, bones rattling to the horse’s rhythm, the skulls smile at their fading backs.   
  
\---

The next morning breaks blazing hot, and before the sun has fully risen, they’re sweating. By noon, it’s agony, and the heat is so fever-thick they can barely swallow in it. The night brings little relief, and the next day dawns just the same.  
  
As they ride, they begin to hear the empty rattle of the canteens, and they savor each mouthful of water, holding it on their tongues until it’s half saliva. The small streams that once crossed the landscape have disappeared, and the heat has taken even the paltriest pools of stagnant water for its own.

Eames has known thirst before - most people of his profession have - and he grits his teeth against the dust and tries not to think about it. Their last drops, unpleasantly warm from the sun, disappear the next day. That evening, Eames limits their food and avoids the jerky altogether.   
  
“Will it help?” Arthur asks. It’s a rare concession of uncertainty.   
  
“Don’t know for sure. Let’s hope,” Eames responds, ladling out his own portion.

If it works at all, it’s hard to tell, because they wake with their mouths sticky and their tongues swollen from thirst. There’s nothing to do but pack up camp and get moving, hoping all the while to see a patch of darkened dirt or a growth of green to signal moisture. They hope against hope, but the landscape is unforgivingly one-note, seemingly dry brown down to the core of the earth.  
  
The monotony of their movement erodes their alertness, like knives rubbed dull, and soon their thoughts go from water to nothing at all. They barely register stopping for the night, minds glassy.   
  
Eames finds that he has trouble keeping his eyes on the land at all. Too often, his gaze slips irresistibly to the coarse hair of his horse’s mane, his back a curve as he sags against the saddle. He’d feel sluggish except for the rapid sound of his heartbeat which keeps time to his short breaths.

The thunder comes without warning, the first roll a shock that cuts through their stupor like the crack of a shot. The air is charged, thick with something they can almost taste.   
  
“Could be a storm,” Arthur comments.   
  
Eames eyes the clouds and says, “Might just be heat.” It happens out here, thunder and lightning crossing the landscape with a vengeance but without water. Despite it all, Eames hears the hope in his own voice. He wonders if Arthur hears it too.

As they move below the thicket of clouds, the light around them darkens. There’s the tingle of electricity up their spines, the charge so strong it could ignite, before the air snaps cold. Eames feels the temperature drop and knows, a split-second before it happens, what’s coming.  
  
He’s laughing when the first drop hits, cold and stinging on his skin. The rain starts to come faster and faster, dropping in thick sheets, and Eames feels the water soak into his clothes then his skin and feels like a new man.   
  
He whoops, hears Arthur do the same amid the patter of rain, and they tilt their heads back, mouths open to the sky like children in their first storm. The dirt beneath them is fast becoming mud, and they relish the muck of it as they dismount to fill the canteens, letting rain waterfall off the saddle into the bottles.   
  
When they finally set off again, they’re slosh with water, satisfied and grinning like fools. 

\---

Most desert nights are warm, but they’re rarely quiet. There’s always the chirp of crickets or the distant wind, reminders of the world around. Tonight, though, the sky is black and soft, a velvet cloth pulled flush over the cage of the earth. It’s hushed, and the warmth of the air settles softly over the land, muting the horses and the crackle of the fire.  
  
The darkness runs deep, and the fire’s glow is cut short by the black. Eames, lying down, doesn’t see Arthur until he’s right by his side, face just warmed by the firelight. He’s so close they’re touching, sides pressed, and Arthur is all heat, hotter and realer than the leftover warmth of the sun seeping through the rocks.   
  
Arthur’s face is close, but in the dim light Eames can’t read him— can’t do anything but look. He feels rather than sees Arthur’s weight settling on him, unwieldy but lighter than expected. Arthur pauses like that, perched, then brings his face close to Eames’. Up close, he looks calm, almost serious in the slight downturn of his mouth. His hand comes up to Eames’ face, gentle as a wing, then stops with a thumb over his cheekbone, strangely tender. Eames looks at Arthur with their faces inches apart, and nods, just a small, slow movement of the head.   
  
It’s quiet, breath barely audible, until the moment snaps, and then it’s quick, Arthur fumbling with cotton and buttons and Eames reaching down to help. They move hard against each other and Arthur drops his face into Eames’ neck, breathing hot until the collar of his shirt is damp. It occurs to neither of them to kiss, not even when Eames’ mouth drips low moans into the curve of Arthur’s ear. They close their eyes and find pleasure in the flood of darkness, every cry a soft apostasy in the cathedral of the sky.

\---

With the bags filled, Arthur and Eames have taken to tying bones directly onto the saddles of the horses. Their strange adornment renders them war creatures, threatening and otherworldly, and every step invokes the deep rattle of some macabre march militaire. There’s not much to do now but head for town, an odd prospect after long weeks in the desert sun.

The terrain they’re traveling over is pan-flat, save for the distant rocks and cliffs. It’s both a blessing and a curse— they can see anyone coming, but anyone can see them too. It’s not so uncommon to see others on the road, dark specks silhouetted on the horizon that gradually form into horses, wagons, even families, all trying to make a living. 

Sometimes they nod a simple acknowledgement in passing, but more often, they simply go their separate ways, close enough to see each other, far enough that no one can get a clean shot. It’s simpler that way, an uneasy neutrality that makes them grateful for the open land when they’re alone. 

The sun is rising at their backs, and its red glow spills across the ground in front of them, lighting the land far into the distance. At the edge of the light, Arthur spots men— three, maybe four and raises the alarm to Eames. 

There’s not much they can do except keep moving, but they’re on the alert now, the last vestiges of sleep shaken from their eyes. They begin to veer left, signaling to the other party that they plan to pass without contact, but the other men move right like reflections in the mirror. 

“Might be nothin’ or they might need help,” says Eames, narrowing his eyes for a better look. There’s some strange movement on the horses, but Eames can’t quite tell what’s causing it. There are things attached to the saddles, odd shapes that feel familiar but not quite recognizable—  
  
“They’re scalpers,” Arthur says, voice dark. 

Eames feels his own posture tighten. Far be it for him to judge another man’s living, but scalping is a gruesome business, all the more so because it’s government work.

“We should shoot now.” Arthur’s tone is urgent, the horses still clipping away. They can’t stop, for fear of being sitting ducks. 

“We don’t even know what they want,” Eames reasons, “and I don’t shoot before a man can defend himself.”   
  
Arthur spits. “Then you’re a fool. You think the government hires them to kill Indians because they’re patriots? They like killing, Eames, and they don’t much care who they kill.”

Eames has come across scalpers twice before, and both times ended with bullets, but he doesn’t fancy shooting before he can see the whites of his enemy’s eyes. He’s surprised at Arthur and his intensity, but he simply comments, “They haven’t shot at us yet.” 

Arthur mutters, “They won’t spook the horses they’re planning to steal.” He looks mutinous, but when Eames repeats, “I said don’t shoot”, he stands down.

When they come to a stop, it’s close enough that Eames can see the scalps hanging on the horses, some dry and some unpleasantly shiny. There are three men, all of them covered in dust. 

“Howdy, gentlemen,” Eames starts, “What can we do for you?” 

The man in the middle speaks, eyes just visible beneath the brim of his hat. “We were hoping you two could spare a drink— we’re just about parched to death.” 

“There’s a small spring a few miles east of here. Seems you’re headed that way already.” The horses whinny and paw at the ground. 

“It’d be mighty appreciated if you could spare a drink now. You see, we’re ‘bout ready to drop.” The man is smiling. It’s three against two, and he knows it. 

“Is that so?” Eames asks, slow.

“That’s so.” His smile goes wider. 

Eames’ bullet catches him square in the chest and throws him backward, feet still caught in the stirrups so that he’s lying along the horse’s back like a circus act gone wrong. Before Eames can blink, a second man is whipping back with a dark red hole in his forehead. The last man has drawn, but two bullets hit him before he can shoot, one in the head and one in the hand. The horses take off running, their masters bouncing awkwardly in their saddles.

When Eames turns to his right, Arthur is breathing hard with the gun still smoking in his hand. 

“Did you shoot for his hand?” Arthur asks, sounding indignant. “What are you, an idiot?” 

Eames chooses to ignore the jab. “I’ve never seen anybody draw that fast.” He can’t quite keep the curiosity out of his tone.

Arthur shoots him a look. “I told you we should’ve shot them earlier.” 

“That’s not how I do things,” Eames says. “I’m not a murderer.” 

Arthur swings his horse around and gives him a long, hard stare. “Maybe not. But you are a goddamn fool.” 

\---

When they ride into town, the lamps are just beginning to be lit as the sky cools from red-hot to black. No one gives them a second glance. A good samaritan is kind enough to point out the Foley China office to them, and they walk in with bones and leave with cash, simple as that.

There’s nothing left to do but buy a drink. The bar in the local inn is unremarkable, but the whiskey burns sharp. They sip quietly, watching the townsfolk mill around them. Their second glasses are half-done and gathering condensation in the warm evening air when Arthur asks, “What’ll you do now?”

Eames swirls his drink around, watches the clear film of alcohol cling to the side of his glass. He made good money this trip with the extra set of hands. It might be enough to marry, settle down, get out of bone-picking. He’s not sure— he’s never tried to do any of those things before. 

“I’m not sure,” Eames answers, honest. “You?”

Arthur huffs a small laugh. “I’m going to buy another drink,” he says, and he does just that. 

\---

That night, Eames listens to the creaks of the inn and the shuffle of other guests as they settle down for the evening. His own bed squeaks when he turns, as he tries to get used to the rasp of the linens, familiar and strange all at once. He can’t quite decide if the sheets and the walls are comfort or claustrophobia, safety or something else entirely.

Light slips in through the slats and under the door, and the flickering shadows loom large on the walls. Eames looks at the ceiling and wonders, suddenly, what the stars look like tonight. He looks at the wall, thin and wooden but utterly impenetrable in the gloom, and wonders what Arthur is thinking on the other side.

With a pang, he realizes that Arthur might be gone before the morning even hits. That’s the promise of this place— the freedom to drift left or right as one wishes, like so much dust in the wind. 

Eames falls asleep thinking of the glow of a dying fire and a dark, still night.

\---

Morning sees Eames up with the light. He’s still tired, can feel it in a tightness around his eyes, but he’s too used to short nights on the hard ground to lie in late. Breakfast is a quiet, solitary affair, and Eames savors the luxury of warm food and slow eating. He could come round to this, maybe— a meal waiting for him in the morning instead of the hustle of cold scraps on the road.

Eames spots Arthur just as he’s finishing the final crumbs, the hum of the town beginning to pick up pitch as people go about their day. Arthur makes his way over, but before Eames can invite him to sit, Arthur’s asking, “You done? I thought we should water the horses.” 

They step outside to air that’s crisp but not quite cold. Eames listens to the familiar shuffle of the horses, not yet ready to break the morning quiet. It’s Arthur who speaks, voice curling between the horses’ brays. 

“I’ve been thinking— ” he starts, faltering for a moment before continuing, “about what to do out here.” 

“What do any of us do?” Eames says, “Besides trying to make enough to settle down.” They’re the first words he’s spoken this morning, and they come out harsh.

“I don’t much want to settle down,” Arthur answers, all his hesitation gone. “I’m going back, Eames. The desert has plenty more bones, and someone’s going to pick them if I don’t.” 

Eames squints at him and wonders what exactly the country holds for someone as young as Arthur. 

“Come with me.” Arthur is ringing with blunt sincerity. “What’s there to stay for?” 

“What’s there to go back for?” A life on the road is a life lived in bursts, endless days punctuated only by stops in small towns. The road is a means, never an end, and Eames thinks of why that is— the dust, the heat, the vast emptiness of it all. 

“Inertia’s no way to live, Eames.” Arthur speaks with all the authority of the young, and when Eames looks at him, he thinks of dust on Arthur’s back after a night on the ground, heat made hotter together, and the vastness of a landscape that’s theirs for the taking.

“Tomorrow at dawn,” Eames relents. It’s not a question.

Arthur smiles. Eames looks at him and thinks that for once, he looks exactly his age, seventeen years of youth shining through dirt-weathered skin.

\---

They leave in the morning, with the bone bags empty but the horses strapped with supplies. The town behind fades quickly, forgotten, and they settle back into the ache of the saddle like ducks to water.

The landscape opens wide before them in greeting, as though it had been waiting expectantly for their return.

**Author's Note:**

> I've entered the west, and boy is it wild. Shout out to Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian, the main inspiration for this fic.
> 
> @adjourn, I'm sorry I made you wait so many weeks for so few words. I hope it's worth it :)


End file.
